By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
Lawrence Township’s faith communities will join together Nov. 25 for the annual interfaith community Thanksgiving celebration at The Church of St. Ann.
The celebration, whose theme is "Building a Home Together," is set for 7:30 p.m. at the church at 1253 Lawrenceville Road (Route 206).
"The celebration is a long-standing tradition in Lawrence," said the Rev. Jeffrey Vamos, pastor of The Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville.
"We gather the community together for the holiday. It is the one thing that brings us all together — different religious traditions or non-religious. You don’t have to be religious to be part of it," Rev. Vamos said.
The service will involve religious leaders from many of the houses of worship in Lawrence, including The Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville, The Church of St. Ann, Temple Micah, Adath Israel Congregation and the Slackwood Presbyterian Church.
There will be opportunities for singing both contemporary and traditional music, and a time for prayer and a time to give thanks, Rev. Vamos said. This year’s theme is Eggerts Crossing Village’s 40th anniversary, he said.
Fred Vereen Jr., who spearheaded the movement to create the affordable townhouse development on Johnson Avenue, will speak about how Eggerts Crossing Village was created and how people came together — not to build a house, but to build a home, Rev. Vamos said.
In fact, the celebration is being hosted by the Clergy Organization of Lawrence Township in partnership with Eggerts Crossing Village. The clergy association is made up of religious leaders from the assorted congregations in Lawrence.
Rev. Vamos said that he and Rabbi Vicki Seren Tuckman will talk about sharing space — creating a home — for both congregations. The Presbyterian Church of Lawrenceville shares space in its meeting house with Temple Micah, which is a Reform Jewish congregation.
Meanwhile, attendees are asked to bring non-perishable food donations for the Lawrence Community Food Bank, he said. All monetary donations collected during the service will be donated to support the Every Child Valued program at Eggerts Crossing Village.
And there will be a farmer’s market that features fresh, locally grown food for the Thanksgiving table, he said.
Rev. Vamos said that holding the celebration also fulfills a civic request to give thanks. As most school children know, the holiday had its origin in 1621, when New England Pilgrims and Native Americans gathered together to celebrate a successful harvest.
There were occasional days of Thanksgiving held throughout the years, but the first time that all of the colonies celebrated a day of thanksgiving in October 1777, according to www.about.com. The first national day of Thanksgiving was proclaimed Nov. 26, 1789 by President George Washington. But it never became an annual celebration.
Credit for the modern concept of Thanksgiving goes to Sarah Josepha Hale, who was the editor of Godey’s Lady’s Book, according to www.about.com. She spent 40 years, leading up to the Civil War, pushing for a national Thanksgiving holiday.
Searching for a way to unite the country during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln discussed the notion with Ms. Hale and on Oct. 3, 1863, the President issued a Thanksgiving proclamation that set aside the last Thursday in November as a day of "thanksgiving and praise."
For the next 75 years, successor presidents followed President Lincoln’s precedent and issued Thanksgiving proclamations of their own, declaring the last Thursday in November as the day of Thanksgiving. The states followed suit.
But in 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt changed the date from the last Thursday of November — which would have been Nov. 30 — to the second-to-last Thursday at the behest of merchants so that the Christmas shopping season would be lengthened.
President Roosevelt repeated the plan to make the second-to-last Thursday of November known as Thanksgiving in 1940. But some states reverted back to the last Thursday of the month for Thanksgiving, while others abided by President Roosevelt’s choice of dates.
But when it was found that changing the date did not help businesses, Congress passed a law that set Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November — and it has remained that way ever since.
